German Proxy Server - or Is it a Polish Proxy ?

I was recently checking out the new German Proxy server at Identity Cloaker for someone and noticed something strange. A German chap who was living and working in the US wanted to watch some German TV sites that were only accessible from Germany and was having trouble getting them to work using Identity Cloaker.

Now I don't use the German Proxy that much to be honest only when I'm in the anonymous surfing mode and get switched to it randomly, but I did know it had been upgraded recently. The DE proxies were the one of the last VPS (Virtual private servers) left in the Identity Cloaker infrastructure and they were switched to dedicated servers because they are much faster and reliable (something to check if you're paying for a proxy service!)

When a German Proxy isn't one!

Anyway I tried a few checks and had some problems as well, some German media sites were blocking me even when connected through a German proxy server which never used to happen before. Anyway I did a bit of research and when I checked my location on an IP tracking site I was surprised to see that my location was detected as Poland, it was in fact a Polish proxy.

ISP: Dediserv City: Warsaw Region: 67 Country: Poland

Well Warsaw to be exact, which was a little confusing as I know the servers were based in Germany. It looked like the IP addresses were listed in a different country that the servers actual location. Well I checked with the guys at Identity Cloaker and they had already realised the problem, a selection of the IP address for the new German Proxy server were actually Polish addresses.

This was causing a problem when connecting through them to German media sites, the location check registered my Polish address and blocked me just like they did when I connected from the UK. You can see the servers in this screen shot from the Identity Cloaker command screen.

If you notice at the bottom of the screen, there are a selection of IP addresses on the German proxy server which will actually return a Polish location. These have been listed separately now so that if you need a German IP address just avoid those.

It demonstrates one of the problems with the geotargeting of content like this, there are many thousands of people who are incorrectly blocked due to their ISPs assigning an incorrect IP address. This is only going to get worse with the addresses becoming increasingly in short supply.

Anyway Identity Cloaker users need not worry as they can pick whichever IP address from whichever country they need from the network. Currently there are servers in the following countries - UK (lots here for BBC Iplayer users!), Ireland, US, Canada, Germany, Sweden, France and the Nederlands.

Here's a good video showing the process, which is currently on YouTube here.

Expected soon are proxy servers in Switzerland, Denmark, more in the US and quite a few other countries.
They are looking into an Australian proxy but apparently bandwidth charges are currently about 20 times more than in the US for Australia !!! If you have a specific need though it's best to check with Identity Cloaker first if the country you need is not in the list.

All the proxies including the German proxy server also support VPN which many media sites require. You can test Identity Cloaker for yourself using the ten day trial for a few euros here - 10 day trial

Update 07/12/13 - Australian Servers have now been added to the network.